


Two stripes

by anotheroneonline



Series: Two stripes [1]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: AU, AU where the war never happened, Everybody is of Age, F/M, Marriage, Mentions of labour and birth, Pregnancy, Severus Snape Lives, characters being ooc, committed relationships, duh - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-17
Updated: 2020-07-17
Packaged: 2021-03-05 00:01:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,631
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25341364
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anotheroneonline/pseuds/anotheroneonline
Summary: A one shot work about what might potentially happen if Hermione ends up pregnant by a certain potions master.
Relationships: Harry Potter/Ginny Weasley, Hermione Granger/Severus Snape
Series: Two stripes [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2002039
Comments: 4
Kudos: 46





	Two stripes

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, so this idea started haunting me a couple of weeks back and wouldn't go away until I wrote it, so yeah here you go.  
> This is quite obviously set in an AU world where Snape lives.  
> Also this story is neither brit-picked, nor written by a native speaker, nor betaed in any way, shape of form, so yeah it's probably a hot mess.  
> And I have no idea what it's like to be pregnant, nor any details about pregnancy, anything that I knew before I wrote this was limited to the knowledge I had collected in 5 years of sencondary school Biology. All of the facts I mentioned are from the NHS homepage, so I hope they are at least partially correct.  
> And also something that I forgot to mention:  
> All of the characters and places mentioned, except for the Child OCs aren’t mine but instead belong to JK Rowling.  
> I hope you read it anyways!

Two stripes 

Two stripes on a plastic stick, that was how it all started. Looking back on the events of that day, Hermione could say with certainty, that the only thing she hadn’t felt was happiness. She was shocked, worried and also a bit angry at herself, but she definitely didn’t feel joy. Hermione sat there on the toilet seat with her shoes still on, that’s how rushed she had been, and just cried for a while. Had it been minutes or hours, she couldn’t tell.  
The very first thing that came to her mind was how she was going to tell the father, because one thing was for sure, he was not going to be happy about it. In fact, she was sure that he was going to scream at her and bring out that nasty side of his character that she had always hated when she was still his student. It was that side of his character, that made him mean and spiteful, and made him spit out sarcastic comments that cut deep wounds into her soul every time he directed them at her. It was that thought process that led Hermione to the conclusion, that she needed to be sure about this before she told anyone.  
So, the next thing she did was booking a doctor’s appointment for a couple of days later.  
When Hermione sat in the waiting room her thoughts began to spiral again. What if she was indeed pregnant? What would her friends say? Her parents? How was she going to manage this without having a nervous panic attack? But most importantly, how was he going to react? It always came back to this thought. They hadn’t spent time with each other in two weeks, due to Hermione’s original believe of having a stomach bug and therefore not wanting to spread it onto him. But if she was truly pregnant, then there was no more hiding from him, to be honest, she had considered running away forever but than decided that that was possibly the dumbest idea she had ever had. She hadn’t noticed how much time had passed, when she was ripped out of her descending spiral of thoughts by the nurse calling her in.  
Inside the office Hermione was greeted by a friendly, middle-aged woman in a white lab coat. She was told to lay down on the stretcher and pull up her shirt. Some cold goo was then spread on her lower abdomen and the doctor moved a controller over it, clearly looking for something of which she still hoped it wasn’t there. What happened then was, what Hermione would later describe as the first thing to ever let her feel joy during that whole time. She heard, what was clearly the heartbeat of her unborn child, looking back she realised that this was the moment in which she knew that she could never give up that tiny human being. She was transfixed, only faintly hearing the voice of her doctor congratulating her, because she was completely focused on the sound of the heart of that tiny being that was apparently growing inside her. Being heavily interested in science, despite her being a witch, she was in awe of this moment. When the doctor asked her if she wanted a printout, all she could do was nod. She left the doctor’s office after an hour with two print outs, a brochure and the confirmation of being round about six weeks pregnant.  
When Hermione returned home, she began writing a note to him, this process was way more complicated than she anticipated. While she wanted him to know that they were going to have a serious conversation about their, so far rather casual relationship, she also didn’t want to scare him. Finally, she decided that she was going to tell him that she wanted to meet him at either hers or his place, though she would prefer not having to have this conversation in his dungeon flat at Hogwarts, where he still taught, she would compromise if he wanted to meet there. Hermione sent the note to him via owl and then made herself a cup of tea while she waited for his response. In his note, that arrived a couple of hours later, he agreed to meet her the next day at her place.  
The next day she prepared dinner and then waited anxiously for him to arrive.  
When he arrived, he kissed her on the cheek and smiled at her, relieved to see that he seemed to be in a good mood. 

“How have you been?”  
“Fine and you?”  
“As good as someone can be when they are teaching dunderheads.”

They went sat down at the kitchen table and ate, she noticed him giving her a look when she poured him a glass of wine but left her own glass empty.  
After they ate, she told him to make himself comfortable in the living room, she then went into her bedroom, where grabbed one of the printouts from the doctor and put it in her pocket. When she entered the living room, Severus was sat on her settee, legs stretched out with is feet resting on her coffee table. She stopped a moment to take in his appearance, his tall statue stretched out before her, his black hair, of which some stray streaks where hanging in front of his black eyes that looked at her expectantly. She walked to the settee and sat down next to him. She nervously looked up to him and gulped hard once.

“Okay, so I’m going to be completely honest with you, I didn’t just call you here because I just wanted to see you. Something has come up which requires for the two of us to have a serious conversation. You know how a couple of weeks  
ago, I suspected that I was suffering from a stomach bug, right?”  
“Yeah, what about it? Hermione you’re scaring me.”  
“Well, my period didn’t come either, so I started to become suspicious and took a test.” She glanced at him and could see that a revelation started to dawn on him. “After the test, I went to the doctors to have the result of the test confirmed. And- “she couldn’t go on, as tears started running down her cheeks. She took the picture out of her pocket and pressed it into his hands.  
A silence followed that was just filled with her muffled sobs. When she had calmed down, she began to rapidly pelt through all of the ideas she had come up with.

“I will keep it, and don’t even try to convince me otherwise.” She glared at him to underline that statement. “You can be as involved as you want to be, I won’t pressure you into anything, you can even choose not to be involved at all, and that would be fine for me too. I just - “she wasn’t able to finish her sentence because he had pressed a finger to her lips.  
“Shh, shh, shh, relax.” Severus run his hands up and down her arms in order to soothe her, but she tried to escape it, so he let her go. “Hermione listen to me. I have to be honest with you that this isn’t quite what I was expecting to hear this evening, but it’s okay. We, and that includes you, me and whoever this might be,” he waved the picture “will work it out and everything will be just fine, I promise.”  
“But how can you say that when everything is so uncertain, I mean we’re not really in, what I would call a steady relationship and I don’t want to force you into anything that you don’t want. “she was crying again, this time nothing seemed to be able to stop the tears from falling.  
“Hermione come here.” Severus stretched out his arms in her direction and she willingly let herself fall into his arms, where he held her close to his body. “It really is okay for me, I have to admit that this is maybe not how I envisioned parenthood to happen to me, but I’m glad it did. After all this time I was starting to think that it may never happen. And I also promise not to abandon you or our child ever.”  
“Thank you.” she said still crying “I was so scared because I didn’t know how you were going to react to this but knowing that you’ve got my back really gives me strength.”  
“Of course, Love.”  
They sat quietly for a while until she asked “Do you think we should make it official? I mean yes technically we are, since all of our close friends and family already know, but I thought more in the terms of officially being partners in life.”  
“Yes, but only under one condition, move in with me.”  
“Do you have enough space?”  
“Not at Hogwarts, no, but I thought we could move into my house at Spinner’s End. I know Cokeworth might not be the ideal for a child to grow up, but – “  
“Shh, it’s fine Severus, really. I’ll move my stuff there this weekend.”  
“No, you’re not. I’m moving your stuff. You’re not supposed to lift heavily.”  
“Okay if that’s what you insist on Mr. ‘I-just-recently-discovered-what-it-is-like-to-be-a-gentleman.’”  
“Ha-ha, really funny Ms. Insufferable-Knowitall. Now off to bed, it’s late and you need to rest.”  
“I swear to Merlin Sev, if that’s how you’re going to be from now on, I will put you under a permanent full-body bind hex until I give birth.” She threatened jokingly while they made their way to the bedroom.  
“Then I’ll better be on my best behaviour, because I wouldn’t miss this for anything in the world.”

On the weekend he came over to pack up her stuff, which wasn’t much because her flat was rather small. It wasn’t that she couldn’t afford a larger place, her job at the ministry paid her more than enough, she just didn’t feel the need for something bigger. Some of the furniture they abandoned completely because they didn’t need it any longer, after all, Severus already lived at Spinner’s End and had therefore already accumulated basic furniture.  
So, the main things they packed up were personal belongings, such as pictures, clothes and other knick-knacks. When they were finished, they apparated to Spinner’s End, where they spend the entire day unpacking, cleaning and decorating. In the end they had successfully renovated the old place and made it look a lot better. They also settled on the fact that Severus’ old room should be the room for the baby, as it looked out to the backyard and also got the most light. In the evening they sat in front of the fireplace in the study and talked.  
“When’s your next doctor’s appointment?”  
“In two weeks and then every four weeks after that, why?”  
“I wanted to ask whether I could come with you, if that’s alright for you of course.”  
“Of course, it’s alright for me you big dunderhead.” she leaned in to kiss him.  
“I’m glad you want to be this involved.”  
“Obviously, it’s my child too after all.”

Two weeks later they went to the doctor’s appointment together, and there she saw Severus cry, for the second time since she knew him, when he heard the heartbeat of his unborn child. They left the office with yet another picture of their baby, which Hermione glued into her newly started pregnancy journal. 

A month later they were told that it was clear for them to tell other people about the pregnancy. So, they arranged to have lunch with her parents on the next Sunday. Her parents had been surprisingly supportive of her relationship with Severus, so she hoped that this news would go down well too. They arrived in front of her parents’ house in Hampstead at 11 am. Inside they were greeted by her parents who were excited to see her, since the last time they saw her was at Easter, three months ago. As her mother hugged her, Hermione was once again happy that she wasn’t showing yet. They first sat down in the sitting room and talked about everything that happened in the last couple of months. Her parents acted surprised about the news of them moving in together and making it official, which didn’t necessarily lighten her mood, did they really seem that uncommitted in their relationship, that even her own parents would react so surprised to such news. They then ate their lunch, a lovely beef stew, and then went back to the sitting room. Hermione then visibly stiffened as she prepared to tell her parents the “joyous news”. 

“Mum, Dad? Severus and I need to tell you something and we want to ask you not to judge as too much.”  
“Well, what is it sweetheart?” her father asked  
“Wearehavingababy!” she blurted out in an incoherent stumble of words.  
“Come again?”  
“We’re having a baby.”  
“Oh Hermione! That’s wonderful news.” her mother stood and embraced Hermione.  
“Yeah honey, we’re happy if you’re happy and we would never judge for getting pregnant, especially since you’re in a committed relationship, that’s ridiculous.”  
“Thanks Dad, that means a lot to me.” Hermione was crying again but this time the tears she shed were happy tears. 

They spend some more time with her parents until they returned home in the late afternoon. Back at home, Hermione arranged a get-together at her place with all of her friends which meant Harry and Ginny, Luna and George. Ron and her weren’t speaking any longer, since he didn’t handle her relationship with Severus rather well and blocked all her attempts at trying to talk things through. It had hurt back then but rarely bothered her now.  
The first ones to arrive where Harry and Ginny who hugged her and who she then showed into the living room. Shortly after arrived George who smiled and kissed her on the cheek. She was glad that Severus wasn’t home on that evening, because he surely would’ve acted jealous. Luna was a good hour late and when greeted, smiled at her mysteriously and in her typical airy voice said,  
“Congratulations Hermione, it makes your aura glow with positive energy you know.”  
“Thanks Luna, but don’t mention anything to the others, I haven’t told them yet.”  
They moved into the living room, where Luna sat down and Hermione stood in front of the whole group.  
“Okay everyone, I asked you to come here today because I wanted to tell you something important.” she made a tactical pause and looked around the room.  
“I’m pregnant.”  
“Congratulations Mione.” Harry said  
“Yeah from me too.” Ginny added  
“You go Granger.” George said whilst smiling at her.  
They then all came together in a group hug.  
“I’m so relieved that you’re all alright with it.”  
“Of course, we are Mione” Harry said, “we’re your friends after all, if we had a problem with your choices, we would have voiced our concerns at the start of your relationship with Snape.”  
“Okay now that the sappy part is over, tell us everything Hermione.” Ginny demanded  
“Well, what do you want to know?”  
“How far along are you? Do you know the gender? Will you marry Snape?”  
“I’m three months along and no, I don’t know the gender yet. So far, we don’t have any plans to join each other in ‘holy matrimony’” she drew air quotes at that word “And if we ever did, I wouldn’t want it to be because of the child, but because he loves me, and I love him.”  
They spend another two hours talking, before her friends went home, and Hermione to bed. 

The next seven weeks after that passed without anything interesting happening. Hermione and Severus both continued to work at their places of employment. The only thing that happened was, that Hermione’s belly started to grow a fair amount and that her nausea, slowly but steady, faded away and was replaced by reoccurring abdominal cramps and headaches in the late hours of the day.  
Hermione was told by her healer that she couldn’t take any potions to ease those symptoms. She had changed to magical medicine because it appeared likely that the baby was going to be magical as well, so it seemed logical to switch. This bothered Severus, who had hoped to rid himself of his feeling unhelpful by brewing her some potions. He had confessed this to Hermione who had reacted by reassuring him that he was already a great help by doing minor things around the house. That didn’t seem to fully convince him but at least brightened his mood a little bit. 

At the next doctor’s appointment, they were told that they could find out the gender of their child if they wanted to. Hermione and Severus, wanting to be as prepared as possible, obviously chose to find out and were elated when they found out that they were having a baby boy. When they came home, they immediately started to brainstorm name ideas.

“Are there any names you particularly want to name him?” she asked as she turned to him from the kitchen sink where she had just poured herself a glass of water.  
“I would like Theodore or Sebastian. What about you?”  
“I love Hugo and maybe Henry?”  
“How does Hugo Sebastian or Henry Theodore sound to you?”  
“I think I’d prefer Theodore Hugo or Sebastian Henry.”  
“Sebastian Henry Granger it is then.”  
“I was thinking more along the lines of Theodore Hugo Snape, but if you don’t want him to have your last name that’s fine.”  
“No, I just didn’t want to offend you by assuming something, but if you want it then Theodore Hugo Snape it is.” and with that he took the newest ultrasound picture, glued it into her journal and wrote Theodore Hugo Snape in his beautiful, kind of cursive handwriting underneath. Then he went up to Hermione and softly kissed her on the lips.  
“I love you Severus.”  
“And I love you Hermione.” he kneeled down in front of her and placed a hand on her belly.  
“And you too Theo.”  
It was then that they felt their son move for the first time, Hermione had felt light movements before, but this was the first time he actually kicked against her stomach wall with full force. Sev looked up to her in disbelieve and then started to smile and chuckle on which she joined in.  
“I think he likes his name.”  
“So, he does.”

Another month went by and Hermione’s bump became significantly bigger which caused her tremendous back pain and feelings of insecurity about her body. These couldn’t even be completely swiped away by Severus who assured her over and over again that, to him, she was still beautiful and it didn’t matter that her belly grew in size, because her body was growing another tiny body, which to him was phenomenal enough, to make up for any physical alterations.  
On her birthday, the 19th of September, Severus arranged a tiny party for her at home for which he invited her friends and parents. They listened to her favourite music and ate cake, which Severus had baked and decorated.  
At six months pregnant, Hermione felt the urge to get started on the baby’s room, while their son would stay with them in their bedroom for the first six months or so, after his birth, she wanted to decorate his bedroom and she also wanted to have space to store his clothes. So, on the next weekend she dragged a reluctant Snape with her into the nearest Ikea and bought furniture for their child. Then they drove, Severus owned an old Volvo, to a specified maternity store and bought those items that Ikea didn’t have, plus some first clothes, including a tiny shirt that Hermione picked out which said, “As handsome as daddy.” Snape only commented it with his trademark death stare but didn’t stop her from buying it. When they returned that evening, Hermione put all of the cloth-made equipment that they bought into the washing machine and Severus levitated all of the furniture boxes upstairs. Since Hermione had wanted to set up the room the muggle way, Severus had already painted it in the colour they wanted a couple of days earlier, so that the walls were now coated in a light beige colour. They had originally wanted to keep the room in neutral colours, hence the wall colour, but then gotten in an argument because neither of them wanted the others house colours, or any house colours for that matter, to dominate the room. Instead they had decided on cliché blue, which was theoretically the house colour of Ravenclaw, but they chose to ignore that, because otherwise they would’ve never been able to compromise. Their friends and family had gifted them a couple of stuffed animals, and while sorting through them it hit Hermione that they hadn’t thought about something rather important yet. She turned to Severus, who was sat on the floor, trying to assemble the nightstand and cursing, because he couldn’t figure out were some of the screws where supposed to go. 

“Severus, Love?”  
“Yeah.” he said absently while fighting with the drawer.  
“We haven’t figured out who’s going to be his god-parent.”  
“I know, but do we really need to?”  
“Of course, we bloody need to, what if something happens to us and there’s nobody designated to take care of him?”  
“What about your parents?”  
“They won’t live forever Sev.”  
“Fine, who do you have in mind?”  
“I was thinking either Ginny or Harry. They both mean a lot to me, they’re reliable and trustworthy, plus they’re in a committed and strong relationship. And I wouldn’t want to burden so much on George, he’s only really gotten over Fred now and he has his business to take care of, I feel like a child would just be in his way.”  
“I agree, and Ms. Lovegood just doesn’t feel sane enough to me.”  
“Yeah, I love Luna, she’s great, but I don’t feel like I can trust her not go on a magical creature hunt and abandon Theo at home.”  
“So, Potter or Weasley?”  
“My gut says Harry, so I think that’s who I’m going to choose. Plus, it makes sense to have him be our son’s godfather, since he’s a man himself and that will probably make for a better bond.”  
“Okay, if that’s what you want then I’m okay with it.”  
She sends a letter to Harry, asking for them to meet at Harry’s place on Friday.  
A couple of hours later, she got a reply from Harry agreeing to her plan.  
On Friday they arrived at Grimmauld Place 12, where Harry lived together with Ginny. Even though Hermione had already been here countless times since they moved in, she continued to be amazed at how well they had renovated the old Victorian townhouse. Something that especially astounded her was, that they were able to dislodge the painting of Walburga Black from the wall. Inside they were greeted by Harry and Ginny who both seemed to be in an overly excited mood. When they were seated in the formal sitting room Harry and Ginny exchanged a look before Ginny started to speak.

“We have something to tell you!” she stretched out her hand and on her ring-finger was a beautiful, but not to extravagant, diamond ring.  
“We’re engaged and the wedding is next June.”  
“Congratulations, I’m so excited for you guys.” Hermione said while she awkwardly got up and went to hug Ginny and then Harry.  
“My congratulations as well Ms Weasley, Mr. Potter.” Severus said calmly from the sofa.  
“Severus and I wanted to ask Harry something as well.”  
“What is it Mione?” asked Harry  
“Well,” Hermione sat back down and lightly squeezed Snape’s hand “we wanted to ask you to become our son’s godfather.”  
Harry’s head almost did a 180 as he turned to look at Snape  
“Really? You want me as the godfather? Are you sure?”  
“Believe me Potter when I say that we’re hundred percent sure.”  
“Wow, thanks. Geez that’s such an honour. Of course, yes of course I want to be his godfather.”  
“Good because it would’ve been really awkward if we asked Ginny now. Speaking of it,” she turned to her female best friend “Ginny are you okay with it not being you we chose?”  
“Of course, Hermione. I mean since I’m marrying Harry, I’m still going to indirectly be his godmother.”  
“Oh, I’m so glad.” Said Hermione and hugged Ginny again.  
They continued talking for a couple of hours, until Severus and Hermione got up and returned home.

The next month passed and Halloween was upon them. Hermione and Severus spend the evening of the 31st with body painting, which resulted in Severus drawing a big, fluffy, black cat on her belly. Hermione also started to become more and more restless, since she was now on maternity leave from work which gave her way more free time than she was used to.  
Nonetheless, the next two months flew by an before they knew it Christmas was upon them. They spent a quiet Christmas Eve at home and Christmas day at her parents’ place. On Boxing Day, they joined their friends for a wholesome celebration at Grimmauld Place.  
Two weeks later on New Years’ Eve they spent the entire evening watching some old classical movie.  
Four days later on the 4th of January, in the early morning hours, Hermione went into labour. Looking back, she would describe it as the most painful thing she’d ever done, but also the most rewarding. When she heard her son cry 18 hours later and shortly after saw him in person for the first time in her life, she felt happier than she had ever felt before. Severus sat next to them and she carefully handed Theo over to him. 

“Hey Theo, it’s me your father.” Snape said softly to the baby who had his eyes closed. He gently stroked the brown-haired head of his son.  
“Mommy and Daddy already love you very much.” He said while starting to tear up and then handed their son back to Hermione  
“Hey Theo, this Mummy and – “she started to cry “I can only agree with your Daddy, we love you a lot.”

The next day she was visited by all of her friends who all got their turn at holding the baby. When it was Harry’s turn to hold him, he started to cry as well. 

“Hello Theodore, I’m your Uncle Harry and I’m your godfather. I promise that I’m going to try my best, but your mum can confirm that I have a tendency to mess everything up, so it’s probably all going to be a mess.” Hermione started crying at that.  
A couple of days later Hermione and Theodore went home to Spinner’s End. 

Three years later:  
Hermione sat in the shade of a large oak tree together with Ginny, who had a one-year old Albus sitting on her lap, as they watched their other children play in the sand box and built a sandcastle. Her two sons Theodore and Sebastian, who was two years old, played with James Sirius Potter, who was three years old.  
Hermione and Severus had gotten married a bit over a year after the birth of Theodore, after Snape had proposed to her on the one-year anniversary of her telling him that she was pregnant. A year later they had had their second child Sebastian Hugo Snape and another year later, Hermione was now pregnant with their last two children, of whom the gender was yet unknown.  
Hermione was happy that her life had turned out this good. 

~THE END~

**Author's Note:**

> So! This is it, I hope you enjoyed this and if you did, it would mean a lot to me if you could take the time out of your day and please write a comment.  
> Also, I decided to leave it up to you which movie they're watching since I don't know which movie they could be watching, as I don't know anything about typical British New Years' Eve movies. If anybody wants to suggest something in the comments, feel free to do so.


End file.
